The present invention relates to the field of telecommunications, and more particularly to an apparatus and method of executing a call between idle Internet end stations similar to a traditional telephone call.
As is well known, a traditional telephone accesses its party through a Plain Old Telephone (POT) Network. And as is also well known, the functions of a traditional phone typically involve tone recognition (i.e., dial, busy, ring), DTMF tones generation (i.e., dialing), and voice analog signal transfer. The traditional telephone gets a line (i.e., hook off), dials waits to connect to another party and then establishes a full duplex voice connection. Through dialing, the well known POT network protocols allow connection to any subscriber, at any desired time.
As is also well known, traditional telephone access is accomplished at any desire time because each telephone has a unique, fixed address, and by hook-off it connects to the transport network. This unique fixed address is generally referred to as a telephone number. Establishing a connection using the Internet in place of the POT network access present a unique problem. As is well known, one cannot use the Internet to make an end to end connection unless each end station is connected (or attached) to the Internet prior to making the Internet connection. Furthermore, it is well known that by attaching to the Internet, the same party may receive each time it attaches (or connects) to the Internet a different Internet Protocol (IP) address. This is generally referred to as dynamic addressing. Therefore, it is known to be difficult to connect two parties or end stations via phone using the Internet because of this dynamic addressing. As mentioned above, this dynamic Internet network addressing differs from the fixed addressing associated with the POTS network.
What is needed is a method and system that can easily and efficiently connect idle Internet end stations at any desired time.
In accordance with the principles of the present invention a method of signaling is provided including the steps of providing a first Internet end station, providing a second Internet end station, establishing a Plain Old Telephone network connection between the first Internet end station and the second Internet end station, exchanging an Internet item between the first Internet end station and the second Internet end station using the POT network connection, disconnecting the POT network connection between the first Internet end station and the second Internet end station, establishing an Internet connection between the first Internet end station and an Internet network, establishing an Internet connection between the second Internet end station and the Internet network, exchanging a first dynamic Internet address of the first Internet end station with a second dynamic Internet address of the second Internet end station, establishing an end to end Internet connection between the first dynamic Internet address and the second Internet address over the Internet network, exchanging voice traffic between the first Internet end station and the second Internet end station, terminating the voice traffic, and terminating the end to end Internet connection between the first dynamic Internet address and the second Internet address over the Internet network.